20
LETTERS.
bridge hills have probably lost nothing by distance
of time or space. I used to hear only the sough of the wind in the woods of Concord, when I was striving to give my attention to a page of Calculus. But, depend upon it, you will love your native hills the better for being separated from them.
I expect to leave Concord, which is my Rome, and its people, who are my Romans, in May, and go to New York, to be a tutor in Mr. William Emerson's family. So I will bid you good by till I see you or hear from you again.
Your friend,
H. D. THOREAU.
TO MRS. E.
CASTLETON, Staten Island, May 22, 1843.
My dear Friend: -- I believe a good many conversations with you were left in an unfinished state, and now indeed I don t know where to take them up. But I will resume some of the unfinished silence. I shall not hesitate to know you. I think of you as some elder sister of mine, whom I could not have avoided, -- a sort of lunar influence, -- only of such age as the moon, whose time is measured by her light. You must know that you represent to